


Numbness and ghosts

by RedFoxsarrows



Category: Fallout - Fandom, Fallout 4, Wasteland - Fandom
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-24
Updated: 2019-03-24
Packaged: 2019-11-29 11:02:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,159
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18222263
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RedFoxsarrows/pseuds/RedFoxsarrows
Summary: Fox, the sole survivor, the famous General of the Minutemen, finds herself wounded badly after a hard battle and struggling to cope with what she has lost. When Hancock goes to be there jokes make realisations about her past hit home and the truth of her past comes out.The first of a few rambles I'll do with Fox, maybe one day I'll  write the full story but I thought some background would be fun to start with. I wanted to make an SS a bit different from the rest and more adapt to living in the wasteland.





	Numbness and ghosts

John Hancock couldn’t sleep, it had been a month and a half since the incident and yet it kept flashing under his eyelids every time he closed them. No amount of jet or mentats or any drugs he could get his hands on could sooth his soul, even the fact that she was alive didn’t make him feel better. She had been so close to death, this larger then life tank of a women, had nearly died from from scum raiders. Knowing it wouldn’t work, Hancock took another puff of jet and settled himself on the bed a bit more, letting his tired eyes fall.

Outpost Zimonja had been taken three days prior by himself, Fox and Dogmeat. The settlement signal was up and all ready two people were starting to build their homes. Hancock helped lift the heavy beams for walls and rolled up his sleeves for the hard work, a little help could go a long way. These people were starting a life, and he was happy to help. Something that he found in himself on his travels with Fox, who had such a heart, such a kind and loving soul hidden deep down.  
Above, on the main radio tower Fox was rigged high up, fiddling with a control panel. Sturges had given her instructions on what to do, and their goal was to broadcast the Minutemen Radio singal far and wide. Outpost Zimonja would boost their power ten fold, and make it heard all the way north and west past the Commonwealth borders, letting a little bit more of the world know that they were back, and where hear to stay.  
The last real thing he could recall was Dogmeat lifting his head and barking at something coming from the West highway, looking up, and then chaos.  
Nine raiders burst from the shadows of the highway, guns blazing and fire in their eyes. Hancock saw Fox firing with a pistol from high up on the tower, the two new settlers ducking for cover to find their weapons, Dogmeat running in head on. After that it was just bullets flying and body’s dropping.   
Then the scream, the heart wrenching scream, bone splitting, ear bleeding scream.  
Hancock’s blood turned cold as he dared a glance up onto the radio tower, Fox had been to easy of a target up high, and had been shot to pieces. Whilst still fighting she had tried to start to climb down, only to have slipped and fell, her rigging wrapping around her right leg and catching her. But the thick wiring was too tight and even from down below he could see it slowly ripping apart her leg as it held her suspended above the fight, making her a dangling target for the raiders.  
By now there was only about four raiders left, and Hancock, Dogmeat and the settlers quickly took up a defensive position trying to give Fox time to untangle herself. But he knew every second up there was getting worse, and the wire was ripping her apart. As the last two raiders fled, he head a shot, a few moments of silence as it echoed, and a sickening thump.  
Fox had shot though the wire and fell two stories onto the brick base of the radio tower. She was only just breaking, limp and bleeding all over, her right leg mangled. Hancock only recalled fumbling with the flare gun, using the one flare they had for the Brotherhood. Fox didn’t like her alliance with Maxon, but always carried a flare in case a Vertibird was needed, it was safe to say this was that time.

It was now starting to rain, the gentle rumble of thunder in the distance. The temperature was cooling and the breeze flitting though the windows was almost relaxing and nice after the hot summers day. Hancock sighed and sat up again, it was all he could think about. Her lifeless form in his arms as he begged for the Brotherhood to arrive on time, to get her to Sanctuary on time, for Curie to save her on time. 

Fox had been unconscious for a month, she suffered multiple bullet wounds, a few fractured bones, and had to have her right leg amputated. 

When she had woke, and looked down to where her leg used to be, Hancock saw her break. She didn’t say a word or move an inch, simply stared for a few moments, taking in what was now not there. A stump. Another battle scar that would never heal. Another result of a war she always had to fight, a war she had no choice in.   
Sturges was all ready pausing on building the huge teleporter that would get Fox into the Institute and had begun building her a mechanical leg that would work just like a normal one, but until he was done she was forced to hobble around on crutches. Anyone could see she hated it, always independted and running around Fox had all but locked herself away in her home. Taking all meetings in her living quarters upstairs instead of her first level office. Other then a select few, no one had really seen her since she had hobbled from the med bay to her tree house.  
A noise above him jolted Hancock out of his thoughts, Fox lived in what could only be called a giant tree house in Sanctuary, meaning there were many levels as the tree climbed hi her to the sky. Fox’s room was just above him, and from the shuffling noises it sounded like she couldn’t sleep either, not that she ever slept much to begin with.   
He slipped on his shirt, leaving it unbuttoned and his pants and silently padded up the stairs to the dark room beyond.   
As his eyes adjusted he searched the room, floor to ceiling bookshelves covered a lot of space; crammed with every book and magazine Fox could get her hands on. Small figurines of deathclaws, mr handy’s and more; a barman skull that acted as a coat hanger and painted in brilliant blue and gold tribe ink. Records and a record player she was working on fixing, bottles of Nuka Cola, coffee mugs and bobble heads. All little things Fox had collected to try and make this new world her home, and in the middle of it sitting on the floor was Fox, who had clearly fallen over and couldn’t be bothered to get back up.   
The moonlight made her orange locks glow slightly, when she had first met Hancock it had been a short scruffy mess, now it fell in a mess of curls around the top of her shoulders. Looking up her bi-eyes flashed at him in the darkness, brown and blue, scars hiding what could have been a beautiful face full of a million freckles.   
“Did I wake you?” was her only words from across the room. Hancock shook his head as he walked over, curiosity on his face. “I wanted… I wanted to shave my head and have a bath.” Fox mumbled after a moment of silence.  
“At 2am?”  
A shrug was all he got back.   
He understood, her life had just been turned upside down, and she needed some control, something to say she had a hold on her life, and hair was the easiest way to do that. Kneeling down and offering a hand, their eyes locked for a few moments.  
They had travelled together for over six months, been with each other almost every waking moment. He had shared things he never thought he would share with anyone, at least not in this lifetime. Hancock had found joy and happiness travelling alongside Fox, and their connection and bond had grown by the day. They knew the other better then anyone else had known them, and a look was all it took to let Fox know he was there to help and took his hand as he helped heave her up and shuffle into the bathroom.  
Fox felt and looked like an empty shell in the lantern light of the bathroom, sitting on the edge of her tub as it ran hot water and slowly started to fill. Her skin was paler then normal, her eyes looked glassy, her body slouched as she stared down at the bandaged nub of a leg in front of her. Hancock let her sit for a moment, before grabbing the razor and starting to work.  
“So why a buzz cut?”  
“Reminds me of my childhood I guess.” Fox’s words were slow, like syrup. This made Hancock pause, for all he knew about Fox and her life in the wasteland he knew near nothing about Fox per-bombs. Other then she was looking for a little boy named Shaun, whom everyone presumed was her baby. In reality that information had never mattered before, just her goal and passion now; but it was a weird sentence that deserved to be looked into.  
“How so?” Hancock's words were guarded, soft as he started to part her hair and cut, he all ready knew a full buzz was out of the question, and had just the perfect style in mind. The ghoul wasn’t great with hair, having none himself but it was a simple enough goal.  
“The army doesn't allow long hair.” Fox replied simply, staring at the mirror as her friend worked. “Why couldn’t you sleep?” the red head added, her eyes darting up to meet his in the cracked and dirty mirror.  
The mayor paused for a moment, cutting off more hair before sighing, “I kept thinking how I almost lost you Sunshine.” he saw a glimpse of a simple on her scarred face for a moment, he noticed it always appeared when he called her that. “I know I’m going to outlive you but you don’t have to make it so soon ya know?”  
A snort laugh came out of the young General, “Don’t worry John,” her voice was sweet, well as sweet as Fox’s voice got, “I wasn't planing on dying without having my first kiss!” It was a joke, and it worked. Hancock found the laughter bubbling up and spilling out as the two friends laughed a little in the ridiculousness of it all. Yet the joke formed even more questions in his mind as he moved to the other side of her head to work.  
“So you really haven't had your first kiss?”   
Fox chewed her lip a moment, staring at herself in the mirror. A million thoughts ran in her head and she had no idea what would be the right one to tell him without scaring him away forever. Without making her loose the one person in the world she never wanted to loose. “No, sad isn’t it? My childhood really didn’t allow for… personal interactions and when I escaped Nate and Nora were married so its not like I got a chance there..” Hancock could see her ramblings coming and smiled a little, after a fight with Ronnie about how she never talked or said what she was thinking or planning Fox had this new accidental ability to ramble, but only to him.  
“Ali said she had been kissed,” her eyebrows knitted, “but all the officers said to shut up and she never looked happy about it when the officers came to...” slowly she trailed off, as if something was drawing on her, something terrible. Hancock hadn’t noticed quite yet as he finished the last few cuts and snips to her hair.  
“Ta-da!” The ghoul proudly exclaimed stepping out of the way so Fox again could see herself in the mirror. Instead of a buzz he had given her a mohawk with some length at the top, so her curls came out in full force. It would look cool with her goggles she liked to wear. Yet when he finally looked down at her face, he saw it streaming with tears.   
Right away he kneeled down and took her face in his burnt hands. “Sunshine whats wrong? What happened did I hurt you?!”  
Fox shook her head as the tears fell, a constant stream down her face now as something in her broke all over again. “I just resized what they did to Ali, why she broke when Alex died. I just resized what Captain Jackson did to her the bastards.” Her hands were clutching his open shirt as she sobbed harder, bending over on herself. “They raped her, I didn’t understand at the time, none of us did we were too young and we didn’t know what any of that was! I didn’t know! Zee didn’t know! But I’ve seen rape survivors now and that was Ali, that’s why she broke… they broke her...She tried to tell us all but didn’t know how, and the officers wouldn’t listen because they did it too! I wasn’t pretty like her but Ali? Ali was too kind and trusting and they abused that! I never understood why she.. why she left like she did but it all makes sense now..”   
Hancock had no idea what to do other then hold her close, rubbing soothing circles on her back as she sobbed. The mayor had absurdly no idea who this Ali was, or Alex for that matter.   
After a while the tub finally filled with steaming hot water, and when she had calmed a bit more, Hancock helped Fox undress and slip into the hot water. She sunk into the bath and closed her eyes, while John found a stool so he could sit by her head and wash her hair, or do something to just be there for his friend that was so clearly in pain.  
“Fox…. Who was Ali?” After a long amount of time had passed, he started to pour water gently over head head and lather it with hub flower soap.  
The General’s voice was shaky, but she took a few deep breaths and slowly her voice grew stronger. “By now you’ve noticed the back of my Vault suit does not say a number like all others, but “Vault-Tech Experimental.” her eyes stared out the window and into the darkness as she spoke, and Hancock moved around the side of the tub and held her hand on the edge, never taking his eyes off her face. Her nude body was covered in scars and burns and freckles, and normally that would excite and please him to no end. But right now covered in bubbles and in such emotional and physical pain, he was just there for her, nothing more or less. The ghoul stayed silent to let her speak her story without interruptions.   
“The army wanted a super solider, Vault-Tech wanted to experiment and a deal was done. They believed that children were the key to the most successful type of solider, train them young, so its all they know. They built a vault just for these experiments to build for the army, and so Vault 75 was created.  
“My siblings and I were the first and last of the Test Tube Baby Experiments. We were Vault-Tech’s pride and joy for the longest time. 20 babies were ‘born’ and within a year there were the 5 of us left, and we got our names then. We all ready showed great mental capacity with a desire to learn, and were enhanced months ahead of seclude of a normal child.”   
Fox’s eyes tore away from the dark window and into the dim lantern lit room. Hancock's black eyes were focused on her and she found herself drowning in them. He was safe, known, an anchor so she wouldn't loose herself in her past. The solider had never talked about her past to anyone before, not in this much detail. She knew she could get lost in a sea of fear and sadness, but Hancock squeezed her hand and nodded ever so slightly, and she knew he would pull her out to the other side if she found herself lost.   
“Zulu Echo Echo was by definition the ‘eldest’, then November Uniform X-Ray and myself Foxtrot Oscar X-ray. After me was the twins, though they were not the same gender they looked so alike and had more of the same DNA then the rest of us. Alpha Lima India and Alpha Lima X-Ray. Or as we started to call ourselves Zee, Nux, Fox, Ali and Alex. We were comprised of all the DNA’s and strands they thought would work best, so we all were technically siblings from the blood that ran in our veins.”   
Hancock let out a small breath, the government and Vault-Tech experimenting on kids, just when he thought the world couldn’t sink any lower this shit happens.   
‘We lived and trained in Vault 75, we had a small city simulation training ground. From as early as I could remember we were trained in all forms of combat, language, everything. Twice a week we were strapped into cyro pods and injected with all sorts of crazy stuff to see what would happen to us. Some made us sick for months, others made us faster, stronger. Sometimes it lasted hours others it stayed forever… we were test subjects but had no idea this is how it wasn’t meant to be. That it wasn’t right.”  
“For the most part, the scientists and trainers treated us kindly enough. It was never loving but they would at least treat us and know we were children. But when we turned ten Captain Jackson stepped in...” a shudder went though her body. “That man rots in hell now, I just know it...” Fox had to pause for a while, letting the hot water of the bath seep over her and relax her body. Trying to forget her leg, her pain, her fear.  
“Captain Jackson was a terrible man, and he took us out for our first above ground missions not long after he came along. The mission was a success and the ambassador they sent us after was dead with no one knowing who had gotten him or how; sending the USA and China into an uneasy accusation battle…. He...Captain Jackson and some of his closest men… took a liking to Ali… and often made her come to dinner in his quarters...only now..now I know why she came back so broken and bruised, and flinched from everyone, even us...” Hancock’s heart broke as he saw the tears in her eyes appear again. There were no words that would ease her pain, what was there to say? Her own sister had been raped who knows how many times and no one had known, no one knew how to protect her. Fox, the type of person she was, probably was blaming herself. So he took her hand and kissed the back of it softly, still holding it tight, keeping her grounded.   
After a long while she started again; “We were 15 when we were sent to China for the first time, deep in enemy territory our mission was hard… and we stumbled upon a mine field. We all travelled so carefully...I remember Ali coming up behind me to take the lead with Captain Jackson, and squeezing my hand and telling me she loved us all so much...” There was a soft smile on her face as she remembered the words, but her eyes were still glassy, “Then she grabbed Captain Jackson at the front of the line and threw herself and him on a mine.”  
Her voice cracked, Hancock could feel all the grief and understanding rolling off her in waves. Knowing out Ali was most likely raped for years made sense to why she was willing to end it all and kill the Captain on the way. He felt Fox’s grief, all her life she had grown up with these four other children and they were all gone. They were the only family she ever knew and loved and from trauma or war they were all gone, and she was left in the wastelands alone, after working as a team her entire life. All she had left was numbness from a leg no longer there, and ghosts of her siblings that she outlived.  
The red head wiped her face with the hand that wasn’t being held by Hancock and took a steadying breath. “Alex didn’t last long after that, 6 months most I’m not sure, the passage of time is weird when no one tells you what time is. Ali was his other half, it was like their minds were connected, one half of a whole...We had set a timed bomb in a building where our target was meant to be and as we ducked for cover, I watched as he walked right in though the front doors and engulfed himself in flame..” Her gaze was back on the stump that was once her right leg. “They gave us a new Captain, Nate, he was young and newly promoted. Nate looked after us well, and told us of his new wife back home in north Boston and how they would have a child soon. Nate became our friend and made sure he did everything in his power to look after us while on missions and training in Vault 75…  
“When we were about 19 or 20… Not long before the bombs fell, a mission went wrong and Nux and Nate were badly hurt. Nate had to be honourably discharged, and we were sent back to the Vault to train and be experimented on more while Nux healed…  
“The new healing serum that they gave Nux...it made him different. He shot up 3 feet overnight and he stopped talking like normal...his skin turned a little green..Zee and I knew when they wanted to give us shots that we would have the same fate. Our brain rotting away so we would be bigger and stronger, so that we couldn’t question our missions or our lives like we always had and were punished for...” Green skin and tall, no wonder Fox’s hands always shook when fighting Super Mutants, it must have been exactly how Nux would have looked.   
She tilted her head up, staring at the lamp above the bath. “Zee made a distraction, stole an officers gun as we were dissarmed ourselves when not training, and blew up some gas tanks...I couldn’t tell you how I got out in nothing but shorts a top and bare feet but I did. And I fled to the north, it took me a few weeks but I found Nate’s house...he took me in and introduced me to Nora and his new baby Shaun. They hid me, clothed me and fed me…. When the bombs fell Nora was at the university all the way at the sea with no way to make it back in time. I took her place in Vault 101..And now I’m here.”  
Hancock now knew the rest, Nate was killed when someone stole Shaun, the Institute. She was looking for the kid because it was her friends child, and knowing Fox she felt the strong need to protect Shaun and make sure he was safe for the sake of Nora and Nate. It all made sense now, why she was so skilled with fighting and tactical plans. It had been drummed into her skull from day one of her life.   
Now she was here, alone in the wasteland and in charge of the Minutemen, trying to make the Commonwealth a better place for her friends son while trying desperately to find him.   
“Well sunshine,” his gravelly voice breaking the silence, dipping his hand into the water he felt it had gone cold some time ago, “Thats a hell of a backstory, and I’m not sure if anything will ever make up for the bullshit you had to go though, but if I can ever help, you say the word ok?”  
The mayor then picked up Fox bridal style, and sat her on the edge of the tub, helping her dry her hair and body, very touch consensual and loving, every now an again he gave her a small butterfly kiss, on the cheek, the wrist, shoulder. All to let her know she was there, and loved.  
Finally back in her PJ’s he picked her up again and carried her back to bed. “Don’t worry Sunshine,” he muttered, you’ll have a mechanical leg in no time and together we will find Shaun and make sure he’s ok.”  
Fox said nothing, just laied down and held his hand, tugging slightly. Without another word he climbed into bed next to her. They had never slept in the same bed before, much less curled around each other so close. But Fox had had little to no loving contact in her life and talking about her siblings only made her long for it more.  
So he stayed the whole night, and every night after.

**Author's Note:**

> After Fox runs from 75 they turn to school kids for the remainder before bombs.
> 
> Zee and Nux- blue eyes, redhair  
> Ali and Alex-brown hair, brown eyes  
> Fox-red hair, left blue eye right brown eye.  
> All have sharp features and freckles all over their bodys.


End file.
